Love Lies Bleeding Read Online Free

them to leave.
    Phil looked oddly pensive — an emotion that didn’t rest well on his normally cheerful face. He belted himself into the passenger seat.
    Pamela seemed to be sleeping in the back seat, but she was really only resting her eyes.
    Erwin cranked the steering wheel, and after hitting the curb on the other side of the street, pulled a U-turn out of the cemetery.

CHAPTER FIVE
    Interrogation Room, Undisclosed Location

    The interrogation room was one of a few in the Undisclosed Location. This facility name was a bit of a joke in the Agency. Vancouver only housed one small satellite office — this one — and all stationed agents knew where to go if they wanted to have a chat with a suspect off the official radar. So it was actually fully disclosed, to a handful of people anyway. Other than that, it looked like any other building in its area of the North Shore.
    A two-way mirror reflected thick concrete walls and a single rack of uncomfortably bright fluorescent bulbs.  
    A medic put final touches on the bandages he’d wound around Pamela’s wrists, but whether this was actually his job or just a favor to Erwin was unclear. Though Pamela’s arms were now clean, the remainder of her looked like she’d slept in a pile of wet dirt. Her makeup was remarkably fresh, though.
    The medic turned away from Pamela and crossed toward the door, beside which Erwin waited. Pamela remained seated at a small, bare table in the center of the room. She stared at her hands, which she held folded in her lap. She was solemn, but not morose. Her wedding dress swamped the metal chair so thoroughly that it almost looked, from the front, as if she sat in mid air.
    “She’s lost a lot of blood,” the medic said, but he didn’t look at Erwin. Something about his stance seemed disrespectful. Erwin either didn’t notice or didn’t care.
    “I gathered. Jesus,” Erwin grumbled.
    “I’ll leave the kit, but I won’t be held responsible.”
    “Don’t you tell me what you will or won’t be responsible for,” Erwin snapped.
    The medic shrugged. “She should eat.”
    “Phil’s on it.”
    The medic exited as if washing his hands of the entire situation. Pamela didn’t look up.  
    “You haven’t even asked a single question,” Erwin sneered as he crossed toward Pamela. “That’s a little suspicious, if you ask me. Don’t you even care where you are?”
    Erwin threw himself into a chair across from her, and she obligingly looked up to catch his gaze. He grew uncomfortable under her steady but sorrowful eye, fidgeting in his chair. “You don’t have to stare.”
    “I’m sorry. You were addressing me. I thought it polite to look at you.”
    Phil, winded but joyfully blustery, entered, looked around, and then flicked a switch that turned on additional lights, less harsh. “Wow, that’s way better.”
    Erwin leaped up as if to punch Phil. Then, reconsidering, he just snatched the brown paper bag Phil carried.
    “Those lights will give us serious headaches.” Phil addressed Pamela as if they were old friends.
    Ignoring Phil, Erwin looked in the bag. “Good, good.” He shoved the bag back to Phil and prompted him with a jab of his head toward Pamela.
    Phil pulled a small milk carton and muffin from the bag, smoothed the bag onto the table in front of Pamela, and placed the muffin on one side. He then opened the milk and placed on the other side of the bag, which now served as a place mat. He waved a hand over this arrangement as if presenting a magic trick.
    An awkward pause stretched between the three of them. Pamela had reverted her gaze to her lap.
    “It’s skim milk. Non fat, lots of calcium,” Phil offered up to fill the space.
    “Good,” Erwin answered.
    Pamela didn’t respond.
    “And a whole wheat blueberry muffin,” Phil helpfully added.
    “Right, whole wheat. Fine, let’s —”  
    “Way better for digestion, and blueberries. Blueberries have … have something good in them, don’t they, Erwin?”